Thread by @ajcdeane

This is the 34th instalment of #deanehistory.

Admiral Maximilian von Spee was a good sailor who died in the 1st World War during the destruction of the East Asia Fleet he commanded , along with both of his sons & circa 2,000 other Germans, at the Battle of the Falkland Islands.

Before that fateful battle took place, and indeed even before the Battle of Coronel prior to it, in which he gave us a pasting, Spee did something interesting.

He feared – rightly – that the time would come when he would be outnumbered and outgunned by a combined Allied fleet.

At that point, his battleships would either prevail or they wouldn’t. The presence of the ancillary ships would make little difference to the outcome of the battle, and might well entail their destruction.

His Pacific Squadron included a light cruiser called the Emden. She was commanded by Karl von Müller, an extremely capable man. In the thinking of the day, the Emden’s armament wasn’t powerful enough to play a part in a battle squadron.

But she was fast, managing over 24 knots, she was well armed for her class, and she could cover over 6,000 miles in a single cruise. In short, she was born to raid. So, at Müller’s suggestion, Spee cut the Emden loose.

When the Squadron put to sea from the Mariana Islands, the fleet went one way; the Emden went another. She was now a free agent, released to sail and raid alone. OK, not quite alone as these ships had a supply ship sailing with them but it sounded more dramatic the way I put it.

The Emden’s supply ship was called the Markomannia, which was no doubt a perfectly good vessel but to my ear the name sounds like a pre-Euro German gameshow.)

It took them four weeks to sail to the Indian Ocean. They made good use of the time.

The crew of the Emden were gifted not only with speed, range and firepower; they were also blessed with guile. Their ship (which was coal powered) had three funnels. On their voyage they fitted a fake fourth funnel.

This was an extremely good wheeze. It disguised her lines, giving her an outline on the horizon similar to the Yarmouth class of British cruisers. It might, they thought, let them get closer to their prey before the threat they posed was appreciated.

It worked a charm. Her successes began on 10 September when the Greek cargo ship Pontoporros was captured – an ideal prize as she was carrying coal, giving a new lease of life to the time the Emden could stay at sea a-raiding before having to put to shore for refuelling.

Next day the Indus, a transport ship full of British troops was sunk– after the men were transferred to the Pontoporros. The next, he caught the Kabinga & released her to sail back to Calcutta with the crews of his 1st 2 captures aboard. The legend of the Emden began to spread.

The very next day the Emden claimed 2 victims, the Killin & the Diplomat, a 7,600 tonner loaded with tea. The accumulated tonnage of vessels sunk by this single ship started to soar. Day after, another two– the Clan Matthews full of agricultural & rail goods, and the Trabbock.

Panic spread amongst those responsible for the safety of British shipping – and amongst the seamen sailing it. Australia delayed the dispatch of troopships bound for Britain and the war. After only a week, the Emden’s effect had begun to bite, with serious results for the Allies.

Müller, after stopping the Italian ship Loredano but allowing her to proceed with her voyage (no doubt burnishing the fast-growing story of the Emden amongst the sailors of the Indian Ocean) decided to make for fresh hunting ground.

Off the coast of Madras on the night of 22 September, choosing a line of fire to minimise harm to civilians in the city, the Emden shelled the storage tanks of the Burma Oil Company. Up went a thousand tons of fuel. I’m trying to imagine what a fire that big looks like.

Efforts to stop the Emden at this point: somewhere between ineffectual & positively harmful. At Madras, the shore battery blazed away at her to zero effect. At Colombo, searchlights helped Müller sink a big merchant ship– after taking her crew off & putting them on Markommania.

Two more days, 4 more victims, one of which was carrying coal, and it was time to disappear and pop up elsewhere as by this point some 16 warships – British, French, Japanese, Russian – were hunting the hunter. He gave them a clue as to his whereabouts by shelling Papeete.

The Emden could pick up how much wireless traffic there was in the area so Müller had a good sense from the increased chatter that there were now many ships pursuing him. He headed south to Diego Garcia.

Then, the island’s only contact with the rest of the world was a twice-yearly visit by a steamer from Mauritius, the prior to the outbreak of war, so the poor islanders were in the dark and positively welcomed his visit. He beached to have his keel scraped, with grateful thanks.

Revenge of sorts was taken whilst he was out of action. The Yarmouth – the poor maligned British cruiser whose lines he aped – found and sunk the Markomannia, and recaptured the Pontoporros. The Emden was truly on her own now.

Solitude, it turns out, rather suited the Emden. In the shipping lanes at Cape Comorin, the southern point of India, in the course of a few hours on 20 October she sank five British ships, stopped a sixth and put the crews from the other five aboard her, and captured a seventh.

This was going some. Over 26,000 tons of Allied shipping had now been lost to the Emden. There had been sneaking admiration for the Emden and her exploits, especially given Müller’s chivalrous behaviour with regard to crews, but up with this we would not put.

Harrumphing editorials in the Times called for an end to the reign of the Emden. Millions of pounds & thousands of tons of goods had been lost. Moreover, merchant shipping in a wide area had been reduced to all but zero traffic: this mattered for the future of the war.

As if to emphasise the accuracy of the increasingly alarmed noises in the Admiralty, the Emden promptly outdid herself. She brazenly sailed right into the bay at Georgetown and torpedoed the Russian cruiser Jemstchoug which broke in two, sinking in under a minute.

Again, all took the Emden for the Yarmouth. You’d think we might have cottoned on by now. But the French destroyer Mousquet was signalling a hello to her false friend at Georgetown moments before she too was sunk. To her credit, her guns were firing as she went down by the bows.

Half the Indian Ocean was now covered in ships hunting the Emden. Even so, Müller stopped the British cargo ship Newburn, whose crew must have been terrified of the famous raider – only to put the survivors of the Mousquet aboard her and send her on her way.

But Emden’s luck was running out. Müller made for the Cocos islands. His fourth funnel was up but was so battered by now that the shore watch saw the raider for what it was. Their SOS call got out before Müller could jam it.

Because the Australian troop movements were back underway, the signal was picked up by the cruisers guarding them – the Melbourne, the Sydney and the Japanese ship the Ibuki. Each was more powerful than the Emden.

To the envy of her peers, the Sydney was dispatched from the convey to deal with the Emden at last.

It was Müller’s turn to be taken by surprise.

He had sent a detachment of 50 men under his Executive Officer, the unfortunately named Hellmuth von Mücke to blow up the radio station on the island. He had to leave them there when the Sydney appeared on the horizon, nearing fast.

The Sydney kept over 10,000 yards away and began firing. This was comfortably within range for the Australians, but at the very outer limit for Müller’s guns. The Sydney was faster, too, so attempts to narrow the gap, to outmanoeuvre, or to flee, were all unlikely to succeed.

It is therefore greatly to the Emden’s credit that she struck first, destroying a turret and injuring a few of the Sydney’s crew. But this was the last damage done by the great raider.

Soon Müller’s ship was ablaze, his steering impaired by damage to his helm, his gun turrets and funnels destroyed.
Still firing with whatever he had left, putting off so much smoke the Australians thought she’d gone down, Müller ran his ship aground.

The Emden was going nowhere, so the Sydney simply left her there and turned to dispatch another German ship, the Buresk. This was a rather withering putdown.

The Sydney returned to the Emden hours later and asked by signal whether Müller wished to surrender. (His colours were still aloft.) Müller replied by morse that he didn’t understand what Sydney had sent. The Sydney clarified by shelling them again.

He was thoroughly run aground. 115 of his crew were dead. 56 more were badly wounded. He’d started the fight 50 hands short because of the shore party. Not a gun on the ship could still be fired. Müller surrendered. Thus ended the glorious, gallant run of the SMS Emden.

Thus too ended the fight for Müller, the closest Germany has ever come to a bold buccaneer, yo ho. He was taken to Malta and then to England as a Prisoner of War. He was physically weak as he had malaria but still tunnelled out of captivity only to be recaptured.

After the war he received his country’s highest military honours, declined all suggestions he should tell his story for profit, successfully ran for political office and, alas, soon succumbed to illness, dying in 1923.

But the crew of the Emden had a little more to add to the history books. Remember Mücke & co, left on Direction Island? We can imagine their feelings as they witnessed the ending of their beloved ship out to sea, unable to help their crewmates, now stranded on the island.

The Australians knew they were there, and were after them, but they seized a schooner in the harbour, filled her with provisions and slipped past the Sydney under cover of darkness.

They reached Sumatra, where the Dutch refused them permission to land, but Mücke arranged for the Choising, a German cargo ship berthed in the harbour, to meet him at sea. He and his remnant crew boarded it, evaded British patrols and were put ashore at Hodeidah in the Yemen.

To Germany’s ally Turkey, they made their way overland to return to the fight, crossing half the world to get back to it. They lost 3 men on the way in a pitched battle with Bedouins. By journey’s end they'd covered 11,000 kilometres, one of the longest escapes known to history.

Their determination, and the success of their adventure on land, is a fitting tribute and ending to the tale of Germany’s famous raider.